Summer Happenings

Well, i'll like to take some time to talk about my summer happenings and adventures, and yes this might be a long one. I'll say that the beginning of my summer kind of sucked. I had come home from school kind of depressed because I was ending off my junior year of college without a major. I had spent two years in the Industrial Design program, but after two years they only allow 16 people to continue. Long story short, I didn't make the cut. So my future had now become very hazy.
Then to add to that, I had a couple of summer jobs that never followed through. The first one was the job I had last summer working at a factory, making trunkfuls of money (well, for a college student it was good), but they wouldnt hire me back because they weren't doing well and weren't hiring. The second job was working for Ribfest, traveling around the country going to festivals cooking ribs. I was really excited about this job just because I really didn't want to come back home, I needed to get out of Indiana for a while. Now this job was about 99% guarnteed that I would work there. BUT, alas, they eventually said they didn't need me...........because the economy is bad. So I applied to a couple of other places in the area and, of course, no one is hiring. So I am left jobless for the summer.......and still have no job. So the start of my summer, I feel, really really sucked and I couldnt wait till August rolled around so i could go back to school.
So with all this happening, being jobless and such, I knew that I would have a lot of free time to do whatever. So one thing I wanted to do was get back into shape. During school I had lost a lot of weight because I quit working out and hardly ever ate anymore because I was either busy or the food that our chef made looked like vomit. So I started biking everywhere, lifting weights three times a week, and wrestled with the high school wresters twice a week. This is pure bliss for me. I love being active.
I also started reading a lot. And one thing I really wanted to do was to get back in touch with God. During college, its very easy to lose yourself in your studies and the social scene and parties, and eventually lose touch with whats important. And, as much as tried to not to, I too eventually got caught up in everything, mostly my studies, which you probably think is a lie, but getting into the ID program was my number one priority for me last semester, everything else was on the back-burner. But anywho, so at the beginning of the summer, I had borrowed some Christian books from Trent, my sisters bf, and started off with Blue Like Jazz. I thought that was an amazing book, it really opened my eyes to a lot of things.
But as I was reading these books, it got me thinking about my relationship with Christ. Now we all know, or should know, that Christianity is all about Christ. And, as Christians, we have the ability to have a relationship with our God through Christ. So I was thinking about my relationship, and realized that I really didn't know much about Him, just things I had heard in church. So, for the first time in my life, I started reading the Bible. I started in the New Testament (jumped straight to Jesus) to find out who he is. Now, there is so much I could say about the things I read, and how I felt while I was reading, and my thoughts on Jesus......but I'll just leave it at, I'm glad that I started reading the Bible.
Now, there have been a ton more other things I've done this summer, trips and such, but these are the major things. But one thing I have learned this summer that I think everyone should pick up is simplicity. I have been virtually broke all summer, I have picked up small jobs here and there: mowing, one roofing job, taking pictures of foreclosed housed for the bank, you know, odd jobs. But for the most part, I'm usually broke. So, being broke, I have no money for gas, so I can't drive. So I bicycle it up when I need to go to town (5.2 miles away). I never go shopping anymore, I'm not picky about what I eat anymore (I'm basically living off of Ramen Noddles and Chef Boyardee), I'm actually really enjoying being broke.....most of the time.
But recently I did take a trip to Vermont with some peeps from church, but I'll elaborate on that another time. It was a good spiritual journey........also a good learning experience. But this post is getting long enough so i'll end it here.


-Life's not about having what you want, it's about wanting what you have.